


violante in the pantry

by QuickYoke



Series: an argument of witches [4]
Category: The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-18
Updated: 2017-08-18
Packaged: 2018-12-16 17:30:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11833581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuickYoke/pseuds/QuickYoke
Summary: it's like pulling teeth, getting Miranda to talk about her past





	violante in the pantry

 

> _“Violante in the pantry_
> 
> _Gnawing at a mutton bone_
> 
> _How she gnawed it_
> 
> _How she clawed it_
> 
> _When she found herself alone.”_
> 
> _-Maria Edgeworth, “The Mimic” (1796)_

 

* * *

* * *

 

When Miranda mentioned over a rare, lazy Saturday breakfast that she was planning on a bit of spring cleaning that weekend, she appeared taken aback when Andy had immediately volunteered her services. Then she had narrowed her eyes in suspicion which -- Andy thought -- was completely unnecessary and more of a reflection on Miranda’s previous significant others than Andy herself. Later that same day, Andy had dressed for the occasion in jeans and a faded band t-shirt that she wouldn’t mind getting dirty, and which had the added bonus of earning an appreciative flick of Miranda’s eyes over her legs. And so, clad for battle and prepared to wrestle with any grime the townhouse could offer, Andy blinked in confusion upon discovering that Miranda’s idea of clutter involved twelve cardboard boxes stacked neatly along the back wall of an otherwise spotless attic.

“This is it?” Andy said as she clambered up the stairs that pulled out from the ceiling of the third floor hallway. “Seriously?”

A few rungs beneath her, Miranda huffed and rapped her knuckles against the back of Andy’s denim-clad knees in a mute demand for her to move.

“Oh! Sorry!” Andy finished climbing up and moving further into the attic. The dark-washed floorboards creaked under her feet. She went hunting for the light and tugged on a string-operated electrical fixture. A bare watery bulb illuminated the space, showing that most of the attic was, in fact, completely empty. At work, Miranda flocked herself with treasures -- riches poured upon riches -- while at home she kept her most personal belongings in precisely twelve boxes of equivalent size.

“You know,” Andy said, “when you mentioned ‘ _spring cleaning’_ I’d imagined that some actual cleaning would be required.”

Miranda straightened and stepped away from the ladder, brushing non-existent dust from her long black robes. “If I recall correctly, you’re the one who insisted on joining me on this chore.”

“Because you said it was -- you know! -- a routine or whatever. But this is-!” Andy waved lamely towards the boxes. “I mean, look at them! They’re labelled and everything!”

Indeed, across every box Miranda had written in neat bold-printed marker the boxes’ contents. She had even used different colours for different subcategories: red for kitchenware, green for spare linens, blue for books and study items, black for heirlooms and magical artifacts.

“How else are you supposed to tell what’s in them?” Miranda replied archly, already sweeping past Andy and towards the boxes.

Rolling her eyes, Andy followed. “So, what’s the plan?”

“What happens every year,” Miranda answered. She took out her wand from a pocket in her robes and waved it at the boxes, which lifted into the air just enough to float gently down to the floor in a wide arc around them. “I sort everything into two piles: keep and rubbish. Whatever is left in the keep pile gets used or put back in boxes and stored. I have the rubbish collected by the House Elf agency. They take it from there.”

With a sigh, Andy lowered herself to the floor, sitting with her legs crossed, and heaved the nearest box towards her. “I suppose I shouldn’t complain.”

“But you will regardless,” Miranda said and though her tone was brusque, the corner of her mouth twitched and she shot Andy a teasing look.

Andy stuck out her tongue in defiance, then opened the box. Humming in amusement, Miranda followed suit, sitting directly across from Andy and getting to work. Rummaging through the first box, Andy pulled a heap of leather-bound and gold-embossed books into her lap. “I’ve got… _The Complyte and Exhausting Compendium of Ninth Centurie Runes_ volumes one through -?” Andy peered into the box and made a face. “- Seven. Yikes.”

Miranda perched her square-faced spectacles on her nose and narrowed her eyes at the books in Andy’s lap. “Keep,” she said.

“No accounting for taste,” Andy quipped, but stacked all seven volumes to the left.

With a grunt, Miranda lifted from her own box a heavy solid gold tea set inlaid with mother-of-pearl rococo cherubs. “Ugh.” Miranda scrunched up her nose. “Rubbish.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Andy groaned, pretending to shield her eyes from a glare of light. “Please tell me you didn’t actually buy that.”

Miranda aimed an affronted glare in Andy’s direction and sniffed, “Family heirloom.” She placed the entire tea set firmly across from the keep pile Andy had started.

“Thank God.” Andy started to pull out more books, but froze. “Hang on,” she said slowly, gesturing around them. “Are there family photos in all of this?”

At that, Miranda went very still. “There -” she cleared her throat primly and feigned disinterest. “There might be.”

In spite of herself, Miranda’s eyes darted to one of the black-labelled boxes, and immediately Andy dove towards it, dragging it across the floor and ripping the top open.

“Honestly, Andrea!” Miranda scolded softly as she added an ancient china set to the rubbish pile, still partially wrapped in old _Daily Prophet_ issues dated back to the early 1980s.

When Andy found a massive photo album amidst an assortment of jewelry cases and various bric-a-brac, she grinned with triumph. “Jackpot.”

As Andy settled the photo album in her lap and opened to the first page, Miranda scowled. “So much for your supposed help.”

“Oh, hush. We’ve been dating for a year and I practically have to pry personal information from you with pliers.”

Miranda grumbled under her breath, but let Andy peruse to her heart’s content. While Miranda continued sifting through boxes, Andy turned the page. She ran her thumb along the edges of grainy old photos, most motionless and muggle in origin, interspersed with the rare moving picture. They started off in stark monochromatic greys and slowly moved to washed-out colour. With a snicker, Andy freed one in particular and held it up. “Is this you and your dad?”

Miranda arched an eyebrow over the box of books Andy had abandoned. “Yes.”

Turning the picture back over, Andy admired its scratched surface. In it, Miranda was no more than a baby strapped to her father’s back while he mowed the lawn in front of a single-story bungalow style home. His long face was turned in profile. While he worked, he had placed adult-sized hearing protection over both his own ears and an infant Miranda’s. Andy bit her lower lip to keep from smiling too broadly and she said, “OSH should give him a medal.”

Miranda snorted, a derisive yet amused sound, but made no further comment.

Andy flicked the picture over to read the back. _James and Miriam -- ‘68._ She put it back and turned to another page. More photos of Miranda, except this time inside the house. Andy shuddered when she saw the stacks of rotting newspaper and bound plastic bags covering the floor of the home in the photograph. Sneaking a glance towards the scant boxes in the attic, towards Miranda, who was pursing her lips and frowning at a battered copy of _A Practical Guide to Counter Legilimency_ , Andy was suddenly very glad Miranda did not take after her father in every regard.

Meeting Andy’s inquisitive gaze, Miranda frowned and threw the book into the keep pile.

Andy turned a page. There in the album, a photo moved. Two identical young women in their late teens -- perhaps early twenties -- shuffled their black-and-white stockinged feet and glanced at the camera, their expressions sour and resentful. Brow furrowing, Andy untucked the picture and looked at the back, which read: _Grace and Georgiana -- ‘71._

“Who are they?” Andy asked. “Your aunts?”

Eyebrows raised, Miranda peered over at the faded photograph Andy held out for her inspection. With a disinterested lift of one shoulder, she said, “They’re my sisters.”

“Your _what?”_

Rather than repeat herself, Miranda held up a sturdy ceramic mug. “Would you use this?”

“Yes.” Andy leaned over and took the mug,  placing it in the keep pile. Then she tapped her finger insistently at the photograph again. “You have sisters? What are they doing now?”

“Plotting my demise, most likely,” Miranda said with a rueful snort. She pushed her spectacles up the bridge of her nose and continued rifling through another box, this one full of old linens. She frowned thoughtfully and cocked her head before tossing aside a set of perfectly nice -- admittedly dusty -- sheets into the trash pile. “They hate me.”

Andy tried laughing it off, but Miranda said it all so matter-of-factly that the chuckle came out nervous. “That can’t be true.”

“Oh, no. They really do hate me,” Miranda replied in a tone light and airy, verging on the edge of boredom. She dragged another box towards her, folding back the cardboard to look inside. She turned over a few silver-tarnished candlesticks between her hands before throwing them into the trash pile as well. They clattered, chipping the china. Andy winced. “My mother wrote them out of the will and left everything to me. Better a bastard half-blood witch than two squibs. That side of my family is very old fashioned like that.”

Andy’s blood ran cold. She swallowed in an attempt to wet her throat, but her words still came out scratchy. “Right. Ok.” She tucked the picture back into its place and took her courage in both hands. “When was the last time you saw them?”

Miranda scoffed, elbow deep in cardboard and kitchen amenities. “What does it say on the back of that photo?”

Andy checked again. “1971.”

“Well, there you have it.” Miranda tossed a gravy boat that matched the candlesticks into the rubbish pile as well. In the waxy bare-bulbed light, her cheeks appeared pale and hollow.

“Not even after -?” Andy gestured weakly towards the black-labelled box of family heirlooms. “With your mother's will and everything -?”

A silver plate clanked heavily atop the growing mound of antiquities to be taken to the dump. “The hack lawyer they elected came in their place.”

“Yeah, but -- what about all this stuff?”

“This…. _stuff?”_ Miranda repeated, her lip curling. She had gone very still, watching Andy in a way she hadn't in years -- as if Andy occupied a station fundamentally beneath her, as if Andy were thicker than pigshit, as if Andy had rolled around in the mud and muck, caking herself in filth and ignorance.

“Don't -!” Andy snapped. Hearing the heat of her own words, she took a deep breath before continuing in a more even tone. “Don’t look at me like that. If you don't want to answer the questions, then that's fine. But don't look at me like that.”

Miranda opened her mouth, but then shut it again in a sharp click of teeth. Her eyes burned and she turned her merciless glower upon an assortment of ill-fated cut crystal glasses. All six of them were put into the rubbish pile. Fuming in silence, Andy flipped through the photo album, barely registering most of the pictures apart from those that moved and arrested the eye. Meanwhile, Miranda sorted through her paltry personal belongings, muttering under her breath. Both piles grew steadily but most items were destined for a dumpster.  

“I tried, you know,” Miranda admitted tersely after a long moment of quiet between them. “I tried giving it to them -- all of this -- but it was written into the will. It would go to me, or it would be locked up in Gringotts. As far as my mother was concerned, if a witch of the family bloodline couldn't have it, no one could.”

“And now we're throwing it away. How is this better exactly?” Andy replied, unable to keep the mean little drawl from her tone.

Miranda’s nostrils flared and she hissed, “And what else am I supposed to do with it?”

“I don't know!” Andy snapped. “Donate it to charity! Something! Don’t just throw it away!”

“What exactly did you think I meant by _'the House Elf agency takes it from there?’_ Hmm?”

Andy’s eyes widened. “Oh,” she breathed in understanding.

“Yes. _Oh,”_ Miranda mimicked her viciously and flung a doubtlessly priceless gem-encrusted goblet into the not-actually-trash pile.

Still, it was with less of a huff that the both of them returned to their respective tasks. Andy’s cheeks burned. Miranda looked almost sheepish as she took out her wand and flicked its tip in the direction of the rubbish pile, repairing everything that had been nicked or otherwise damaged. Andy darted a glance in Miranda’s direction, but Miranda was pointedly ignoring her now.

A year had passed and they were still new at this. Andy kept her apartment in Barking more as a symbol than anything else; half of her week was spent at Miranda’s townhouse. Most days she groused about leaving some article of clothing or another at her other residence, but Miranda had yet to extend Andy a formal invitation into her home. Whenever Andy went for a leisurely shuffle through the kitchen pantry in a bathrobe on the hunt for food, Miranda’s expression would turn distant and she would hide behind her morning _Prophet_ , communicating in grunts, hums and monosyllables. Andy never pushed. The days slid by like meat from the bone and neither of them put to words what they already knew at heart.

Andy almost turned another page of the photo album, but paused. A severe woman in black robes glared from a small motionless photograph in the bottom corner, her eyes somehow pale and dark all at once. She held her mouth at a cruel, tight slant and her chin at a haughty tilt. Her dark hair was streaked with grey at the temples, iron-threaded wings arching over her ears and clapped in a bun at the nape of her neck. Andy stroked her fingertips along the edge of the picture before flipping it over, but nothing was written on the back.

Andy held the photograph up for Miranda and though she already knew the answer, she asked. “Who’s this?”

Mouth thinning to a hard narrow line, Miranda leveled a look at Andy over the rim of her glasses. “What do you think?” she countered with the barest trace of a sneer.

Whether Miranda had intended to look exactly like her mother or not, Andy couldn’t tell. And it wasn’t that Miranda frightened her -- not anymore, certainly not like she used to,  or so Andy told herself -- but all it would take was one stumbling misstep for everything to fall apart. Andy wavered at the edge of a precipice, nudging rock and bone into the chasm below with her toes, waiting for the echo and clatter of when they reached bottom, waiting.

Waiting.

“Nothing,” Andy said. She placed the picture back, already turning the page. “Never mind.”

Silence followed. Andy could feel Miranda watching her. From the corner of her vision, Miranda’s hair seemed carved from cold ivory. The silence tensed like a muscle, like a clenched fist. Miranda turned back to the boxes, but Andy couldn’t shake the sensation of eyes pale and dark all at once -- an unspoken contradiction -- boring into her from across the attic.

“Miranda -?”

At the sound of Andy’s voice, Miranda’s jaw clenched. She did not look up from her digging through the boxes, yet her voice lowered to a dangerous growl. “So help me God, if you wave one more photograph in my face, I’m going to burn the whole damn album.”

Andy held up a picture of Miranda cradling newborn Caroline and Cassidy to herself. In it, her hair was mussed and sweat-slicked; she was still dressed in a white hospital gown at St. Mungo’s. Smiling softly, her voice somewhat breathless, Andy asked, “Can I frame this one?”

Any waspish retort died on the tip of Miranda’s tongue. She stared at Andy, her face going briefly slack before tensing once more. Swallowing thickly, Miranda fumbled at words, “Where -- Where would you -- ah --?” Without finishing the sentence, she gestured towards the photograph with an antique spoon, which hung limply from her fingers.

“The bedroom. On my bedside table -- or -- uh -- not _‘my’_ bedside table. Just the table on the side of the bed where I usually sleep,” Andy corrected. With a twist of her narrow wrist, she turned the picture back towards herself to admire it. “I thought -- I mean --  There aren’t many pictures around the house and I’d kind of like it.”

Miranda’s expression grew closed and guarded, building walls as fast as she could to hide whatever tumult of emotion brewed beneath the surface. Even after a year of being together, she could not break herself of this habit. Even after Andy went through with mallet and chisel, knocking down every barricade, stone by stone, Miranda scurried around after her, placing each block back into place. The more intense the feeling, the higher Miranda erected her fortifications, and today Andy had to crane her neck to peer up the steep and towering parapets.

Clearing her throat, Miranda set the spoon atop the rubbish pile and took off her glasses to clean them on the edge of her robes. Once upon a time, it might have come off as officious and brusque, but now she only appeared wounded, as if using the action to hide a limp. When she spoke again, her voice remained soft and trembled only slightly. “If you must.”

Andy beamed and tucked the picture to one side for later. “Thanks.”

Carefully, Miranda nodded her spectacles back into place and focused her attention on the nearest box. “Yes. Well,” she said faintly as she reached into the box and frowned down at its contents. She pulled out an ornate glass lampshade, then darted a furtive look in Andy’s direction before pretending to have never done so in the first place. Straightening her shoulders, Miranda announced to the lampshade, “The third box to your left.”

Bewildered, Andy looked over her shoulder towards the box. “What about it?”

“There’s a black velvet case.” Miranda set down the lampshade in the rubbish pile and held out her hand for Andy to fetch the box and give it to her.

Delving for the item in question, Andy passed it over. Miranda muttered an incantation over the case, and the black velvet flared, ink-bright. The hinges creaked when Miranda opened it to reveal the goblin-forged diamond choker they had used as a portkey nearly three years ago. The links glittered and seemed to slither between Miranda’s fingers as she picked it up and held it out towards Andy with a meaningful look.

Andy blinked dumbly at Miranda, then at the necklace and back again before it clicked. “Oh, no. No way.” She shook her head with an incredulous laugh. “No no no. I can’t.”

“You can and you will.” Miranda crooked her finger for Andy to lean forward.

“I really don’t think -” Andy began to mumble, but crouched on her knees, her fingertips just resting against the wooden floorboards, so that Miranda could reach around her neck and fasten the clasps. Miranda’s perfume hinted at sandalwood, and even after all this time Andy had to swallow down a heady surge of desire at the nearness of her. The coolness of the stones and metals rested against her throat and Andy ducked her head when she felt Miranda cup her cheek.

“There,” Miranda breathed, her words a warm whisper against Andy’s skin, her palm splaying out against Andy’s jawline. “It suits you. I knew it would.”

Shrugging against her shabby muggle clothes, Andy joked, “Wish I wore something that matched.”

Andy’s voice died away as Miranda began to trail her hand down the choker, counting diamonds with her fingertips until she brushed aside the loose neckline of Andy’s t-shirt to reveal her collarbone. “You’ll wear it for me on a special occasion,” Miranda said, her voice hoarse, and for a brief moment hunger roared in her eyes until Andy could see it gnawing her up from the inside, teeth fixed into a ragged thighbone, splitting the marrows.

The breath hitched in Andy’s chest and suddenly Miranda jerked back as though stung, as if she were a naughty child scolded for being caught red-handed with a fistful of biscuits from the pantry jar. She clutched her hand to her chest before hiding it behind her back and when she looked towards Andy again -- indirectly, as if skirting glances around the corona of an eclipse -- Miranda’s expression bordered nearly on timid. “You will, won’t you?”

“Yeah,” Andy croaked. Clearing her throat, she sat back on her heels and reached up to unlock the choker. It slumped from her neck, heavy in her hands. Miranda handed the velvet case over, but refused to look at her.

“Hey, I -- uh --” Andy stumbled over the words as she put the diamond choker away, snapping the black velvet lid shut. She nervously brushed her thumb back and forth across the smooth, bevelled edge. “I wanted to ask you something.”

Immediately Miranda stiffened. Her expression grew cagey once more, as if Andy were trying to trap her in place with iron-wrought bars. What a hypocrite, after all but circling Andy's neck with a diamond-studded collar and leash. Rather than speak, Miranda hummed a curious lilting note and tugged at a lock of hair against the nape of her neck as if smoothing it down -- a self-conscious gesture.

“You know how I was going back home for Easter this year?” Andy began.

Miranda nodded, a stiff jerk of her head.

“I was wondering if -- and you don’t have to, but --” Andy bit her lower lip. “Would you and the girls like to come?”

If anything, Miranda’s wariness only doubled at the mere suggestion. “Have we been invited?” she sounded skeptical.

“Not exactly?” Andy grimaced and shut the photo album, placing it to one side. Then she rushed to add, “But I want you there! I know my parents haven’t exactly been open to this whole thing, but they’ve also never met you in person and I want them to. You’re a part of my life.” Andy shrugged. “All of you are.”

As she considered the offer, Miranda twisted her fingers together in her lap the way she used to when she wore a wedding ring. Now, with her fingers bare, it was as close as she came to wringing her hands. She worried the inside of her cheek with her tongue and Andy held her breath in suspense.

“The girls can’t -- they're going to be with their father this Easter,” Miranda said very slowly, very carefully, each word wrest from her mouth like individual teeth. “But I -- I suppose I could accompany you. I'll have to check my schedule.”

All the pent-up tension unclasped from around Andy’s throat, pooling in her gut. She smiled broadly. “Great!”

“Mmm,” came Miranda's only reply. She gave her silver hair one last unnecessary pat before inhaling briskly and turning to weigh the fate of another stack of books. As Andy put the photo album in the keep pile, Miranda murmured with false indifference, “Your parents, have you introduced them to any of your other -?” she scrunched up her nose and tossed the books in the rubbish pile. “- _beaux?”_

Andy shrugged and dug around in a box of kitchenware. “A few. To be honest, they haven’t liked most of them.”

“No accounting for taste,” Miranda mimicked Andy’s earlier words with scathing accuracy, smirking when Andy shot her an unimpressed glare in reply. For all that the air had thawed, she still wouldn’t look at Andy, letting her glance linger a little too long at Andy’s bare ankles before whisking her gaze away once more.

Reaching out, Andy placed her hand on Miranda’s knee, tapping her thumb against it. “Hey,” she said softly, ducking her head to try to catch Miranda’s eye to no avail. “If you don’t want to come, you don’t have to. I haven’t told my parents to expect you, or anything. We can wait, if that would make you more comfortable.”

“That’s not -!” Miranda started to say in a sharp tone. She scowled at Andy’s hand but did not push her away. “We’ll do it. It’s fine.” She reached for a box that clattered with cutlery and repeated more steadily this time. “We’ll do it.”

“Ok.” Andy rubbed her hand against Miranda’s knee, then leaned back. Pulling out a silver-chased _cafetière à piston_ from the nearest box, Andy asked, “Toss or keep?”

Looking directly at Andy at last, Miranda cocked her head. She didn’t spare the _cafetière_ a glance. Something raw lingered in her eyes as she studied Andy, but she masked it with a small smile. “Keep.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> I was supposed to be done with this series, but then I got an ask on tumblr with an Anne Carson quote as a prompt and I couldn’t resist:
> 
> “You remember too much,  
> my mother said to me recently.  
> Why hold onto all that? And I said,  
> Where can I put it down?”  
> -Anne Carson, “Glass, Irony and God”


End file.
